


Priorities

by OneForMischief



Series: a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves. [1]
Category: Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, F/M, Hospitals, Male-Female Friendship, Mostly Dialogue, References to Abortion, References to Suicide, Snuggies, Unhealthy Relationships, mocking Cleveland
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-21
Updated: 2012-12-21
Packaged: 2017-11-21 23:11:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/603111
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OneForMischief/pseuds/OneForMischief
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jarvis accidentally breaks spectacularly bad news, Tony takes it pretty terribly, and Natasha is secretly a knitter.</p><p>Features some should-we-move-in side plot.</p><p>Could not have had a higher ratio of dialogue if I'd tried.</p><p>Also, sorry, Cleveland.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Priorities

“You son of a bitch,” Romanova is growling, and he wants to laugh but he can’t, it hurts too much, and he knows what that means.

He’s still alive.

* * *

 

“Barton, there’s no way to put that much firepower into –“

“Sir, there seems to be a suspect transaction on your AmEx. Protocol dictates that you or Miss Potts must review the charge before I approve payment.”

“So…alert Miss Potts, Jarvis. You know I don’t deal with these things. Anyway, as I was saying –“

“Sir, Miss Potts is in a very important meeting and has asked not to be interrupted until –“

“Jesus Christ, J. Fine. Sorry, Clint,” Tony frowns, heading for desk. Clint just shrugs.

“We can finish arguing over dinner. Tasha thinks we should get Korean barbecue and try to lure Banner out, but I was kind of craving pasta. Any opinions?” he asks, knowing that Stark will side with Banner but that he’ll pay for Clint’s dinner if he thinks it’ll make him want to move in.

* * *

 

“He said, and I quote, ‘Tell Natasha she can have all the Korean barbecue she wants, on me, but I’m staying home and waiting for Miss Potts.’”

“He called her Miss Potts? He only does that when he's fighting with her,” Bruce says, and he looks suspicious.

“Why don’t we just listen to the man and eat some ribs,” Nat insists. Her increased metabolism has had enough standing around, and nobody argues with her.

~*~

Tony watches them leave from the penthouse window, swirling the scotch in his glass.

“Jarvis, do whatever you have to do to get those records.”

* * *

 

“Nothing takes the class out of hundred year old scotch like drinking it straight from the bottle,” Pepper says with a roll of her eyes as soon as she’s off the elevator, and suddenly he hates her.

He hates the clack of her heels on the marble.

He hates the bounce of her stupid cheerleader ponytail.

He hates that she wouldn’t care how drunk he were if he were still using the glass.

He picks it up and throws it.

* * *

 

“I like it. He’s easier to live with than you’d think,” Bruce mumbles around a rib, painstakingly trying not to get sauce on his shirt as though he’s forgotten that he can wash it as soon as he gets home now.

“He was sort of fun to spy on,” Natasha agrees. “I think I could get used to having an address.”

“You? You almost punched me in the face the last time I suggested something like this.”

“Barton, a two bedroom rat’s nest in Cleveland is not the same as a suite in Stark Tower and my own armory.”

“Cleveland? No wonder you said no. Even the other guy wouldn’t go there,” Bruce says, and they all laugh.

* * *

 

“And then you’d have just said ‘it’s cool, Jarvis, pay it,’ like it was a god damn pair of shoes, and since when do you charge fourteen hundred dollar shoes on there, while we’re on the subject?” Tony yells, flinging another glass at the wall behind her.

“Since I was twenty-three years old and I took this job, which I stayed in a lot longer than any other assistant you ever –“

“Yeah, because you fell in love with the poor drunk billionaire who let you buy millions of dollars’ worth of shitty modern art and handbags, and didn’t know his own social security number and couldn’t remember who he just fucked without Jarvis around to –“

“That’s right, Tony, I fell in love with that guy. Not this crazy person who flies nuclear bombs into magical space portals and then comes home and knocks me up like a complete jackass –“

“Fuck you, Pepper,” Tony mutters, sliding down the wall and half-heartedly tossing the last glass at her. They both watch it land, breaking off one edge and lying on its side outside the circle of smaller fragments.

Pepper throws her Stark Industries I.D. on top of it and gets back into the elevator.

* * *

 

“Hello?” Bruce asks, covering his other ear with one hand to try to hear over the noise in the crowded restaurant. “Jarvis, is that you? What do you – yes, yes, override protocol eight one nine, we’ll be right there.”

“Bruce?”

“We need to get back to the tower, now. Can you get us there faster than an ambulance?”

“No,” Clint says, jumping up, “but Tasha can –“

She’s already throwing her heels at him and running out the door.

* * *

 

She’s never been so grateful to the Red Room as she is as she runs into the lobby of Stark Tower faster than most Olympic athletes could dream of. Jarvis opens the elevator for her, and she nearly hits the back wall before she stops herself, all of her grace out of the picture.

“He’s bleeding profusely,” Jarvis tells her, but the doors open again before she can respond.

Jarvis was not exaggerating, she thinks grimly as she runs to Tony and pulls her shirt over her head, tying it as tightly as she can just above the deep gash in his wrist.

“Tony, if you live through this, I will move in, and I’ll bring Barton. I’ll even talk to Rogers, but you are not allowed to die, you ass,” she orders, slapping his face gently. “Come on.”

* * *

 

“My feet were not a priority at the time,” she snaps at the doctor who is pulling bits of glass out of them with tweezers and rolling his eyes at her. “Hurry it up, I can take the pain.”

“Ma’am, I –“

“I’ll take over from here, Evans,” Bruce says, and the other doctor happily hands over the tweezers and the dish he’s been tossing the glass in. Dr. Banner gets right to business, yanking out the shards with a cavalier attitude that confirms to Natasha that he knows about the serum. The smaller punctures heal before he pulls the next bits out.

“What happened, Tasha?” he asks after the doctor is out of the room.

“There was glass everywhere. He was more important.”

* * *

 

Clint stands by and watches Tony sleep, wincing when he looks at the wide band of gauze and pressure tape around his left wrist.

“Hey boss,” he says without looking up.

“How is he?” Fury asks, sounding uncharacteristically concerned.

“Fine, physically.”

* * *

 

When Tony fully wakes up, the first thing he sees is Fury’s fucking eye patch.

“Jesus Christ!” he yells, jumping a little.

“Nicholas Fury, actually,” the director sighs with relief, slumping back into his chair. “You really scared the hell out of us, Stark. Don’t do it again.”

* * *

 

Two days later, he wakes up to the muted click of Natasha’s knitting needles.

“Are you wearing a Snuggie?” he asks, blinking sleepily.

“Don’t laugh. It’s your stupid Snuggie,” she grins, not taking her eyes off of her work.

“It was a gift,” he counters. “Tasha –“

“Don’t. It was nothing. Change the floor plan for my suite a little and we’ll be even.”

“Oh?”

“I want a bathtub big enough for the Hulk,” she says, and he can’t resist that one.

“Is that hypothetical, or do you need some custom-sized towels, too?”

* * *

 

When he gets out of the twelve weeks of hellish rehab and counseling that follow his release from the hospital, he comes home to find that his bar is gone, and in its place is a lumpy package wrapped in Iron Man paper. He opens the card first.

_Stark, I hope you like this one, because you’re never getting the other one back. I like it. Natasha_

He peels back the paper and finds that she’s knitted him a new Snuggie.

* * *

 

Guilt does funny things to people, Tony thinks as he changes the color scheme of Thor’s suite on the model and adds another residential floor beneath it. Before he tried to end things, he’d had Natasha considering a move and Bruce happily installed on the floor beneath his. Now Barton’s moved in, Thor is bringing his girlfriend and her tazer-happy intern, and even Cap is taking a small suite, though he isn’t giving up his apartment just yet.

“It’s not guilt, you idiot,” Tasha says, and either he’s been talking out loud or she’s getting creepier.

“You were talking out loud.”

“You’re getting creepier,” he tells her.

“I know. You ready to talk about Pepper yet?”

“Am I allowed to say no?”

“Not really.”

He sighs. This would have been easier if he had a drink.

“She had an abortion, and I only found out because Jarvis flagged the payment on my credit card.”

Natasha mutters something in Russian, something swift and soft like a curse, and he realizes that he’s going to be okay.

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally the prologue to something completely different, but it has a Tony/Natasha undercurrent I couldn't address or avoid in that story.


End file.
